For Pride 2010, we asked an eclectic group for their take on Gay Pride. From living to loathing, the responses cover a wide spectrum - a rainbow of opinion, perhaps?
Thus far our responses have been from gay fellows. But what about straight girls? What do they make of it all. Last year my friend (and baking buddy) Joanna Rice went on a Pride exodus with me. The retired blogger has dusted off her keyboard to give us her take:
As with almost all moments of brilliance, it began with beer, even though, in hindsight, it seems like a blur how foolish brainstorming over beer led to my finding myself in the middle of 37th Avenue, Jackson Heights, wearing a fluffy-shouldered peach satin gown I picked up for a few bucks from Goodwill. Later, inexplicably, I am tightly gripping a banister on a massive float down Fifth Avenue swaying not from the transit but from the motion of all my companions dancing to the deejay behind us. We turned onto Christopher Street and the entire street bombards us with love and support. Total strangers wave at me. Countless faces beam at me. I meet eyes with a few and I read “Thank you.” But I want to thank them more for one of the most amazing moments in my life. This is It. I’m here. I’m actually here. In the Queen Mother of New York City Parades. Pride. And I never felt so much love in one place at one time, and, and …
And I’m getting ahead of myself here.
Having grown up in New York City, I’ve known Pride. I’ve heard of it. Even passed by it a couple of times during my roaming around youth about the parts of the Lower East Side and The Village. I remember The Pier. The Old Pier. The massive holes in chain link fences to walk out into the water-surrounded darkness that was both secluded and yet always crowded with people with all different agendas. Going to the LGBT Youth Center on Christopher Street with my bi-curious friend to support her and learning what a dental dam would be used for. Pride was just another event in the City of many events. Pride was a party. A chance to be foolish in the streets of New York more so than usual. Watch the queens dress up and act out. "Girlfriend". "Yes, Miss Thing". Giggle, maybe a, "You Go Girl"x. Unserious. Playful.See, I was a bystander. A watcher of events. I’m a child of New York, exposed to so much but involved in so little. But then I was invited to a beer by a good friend. And I can never say no to beer or to him which then led me to saying yes thus opening me up to one of the greatest experiences in my life.
